Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Hi guys,

there are alot of topics around about FAN noisy, CPU melting, etc , sometimes the reason is "hybrid graphics" and sometimes the cause is unknown, I saw on other topics "tricks on how to control the FAN" which shouldn't be used as the FAN is just trying to do what is supposed to do, when the CPU temperature get's high he also is actioned in order to cool it down.

and yet after all this tunning, the max you can get it's a 50°C with few applications open (no CPU consuming Job's).From the other part, on windows, there are a lot more processes using a lot more resources but yet it's more "healthy" for the CPU and the motherboard.

Now don't get me wrong , I'm not trying to get a comparing between the 2, but I'm interested in your opinion about this behaviour and what could be the fault or the difference, maybe it's the kernel or a patch or something else?

Any thoughts are welcome with also additional information or correcting mine.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Based on the information I have, all softwares use the same hardware controllers in disposition of the Laptop/PC to determine the temperature (so they use the same sensor for the CPU , 1 for the GPU if it have it, 1 for the motherboard etc), and I use sensors on Linux and I don't remember the last on windows but was pretty reliable.

Based also on what I read on this forum and others, it's a very common experience from users to have the same impression, although you can try triggering the FAN on both, it takes nothing on Arch to get it running [just do a kernel upgrade] (it means that the temperature is more than 55°C) but on windows it's a different story, normally it takes a bad written game with full 3D graphic effects and stuff to get it in shape

However a research could easely tell that it's a wide spread behaviour, gentoo, ubuntu, vector linux, mint, etc, etc.. I remember also seeing a kernel bug on the topic but it seems:# uname -r3.8.11-1-ARCHnot yet fixed...

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Actually I'm quite impressed, I don't know the reason but when I retested they ran at the same temperature, although windows was updating and had a lot of work (every program was updating because I didn't start it from a long time and the antivirus begin scanning) however the last test which I did months ago turned up showing windows running around 40° and arch running around 50° .

However I will test it again as I started windows immediately after turning off from Arch so teh heat was there and as we know the fan is not turned on for the temperature being around 50°.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

nomorewindows wrote:

Comparing windows and arch is really not a good comparison. Comparing another distro with arch, will come closer, but still difficult to compare even then.

The comparison is valid in this case. Looking at the people to your left and right is not always enough to find your own flaws. Sometimes you need to travel abroad to see what you should like about yourself and what needs to be improved.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Hi there

I had the same issues when using open source drivers for my Graphics Card (an AMD Radeon HD 6320). When I switched to Catalyst (AMD's binary blob) the T° dropped significantly, saving a lot of power and cooling down my entire system... Working like a charm and reasonably cooler than Win7

Maybe you could try the proprietary drivers for your graphics card to check out the temperature if you haven't done it already. At least, it worked for me.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Silex89 wrote:

Hi there

I had the same issues when using open source drivers for my Graphics Card (an AMD Radeon HD 6320). When I switched to Catalyst (AMD's binary blob) the T° dropped significantly, saving a lot of power and cooling down my entire system... Working like a charm and reasonably cooler than Win7

Maybe you could try the proprietary drivers for your graphics card to check out the temperature if you haven't done it already. At least, it worked for me.

Best of Luck

Hi,

yes actually I was thinking of that, but actually although my dual card

So practically it says disabled, I'm not sure however as I'm convinced that there is a big lack on hybrid card support and not being able to use the ATI card anymore that's another trail.

but what do you think, I should be ok by not using it, as suppositly it's "disabled" correct? [What I mean is, as the hardware is disabled by acpi_call the driver shouldn't make a difference, is this correct?]

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

In very, very general terms. (Did I mention very)

If a system is designed to allow for a 70C rise over ambient (100C-30C); and if the cooling system is designed for 70 W, that would equate to a thermal conductivity from the junctions in the processor to room ambient air of about 1 degree C/Watt.

Using that thermal conductivity in a system where we are seeing a 10C additional rise means, in this contrived example, we about are talking on the very rough order of 10W additional. The AMD 4200 mentioned is 89 W.

So, does a 10 W delta make sense? Does anyone want to run this past powertop to see if there is any correlation?

Last edited by ewaller (2013-05-16 21:45:23)

Nothing is too wonderful to be true, if it be consistent with the laws of nature -- Michael FaradaySometimes it is the people no one can imagine anything of who do the things no one can imagine. -- Alan Turing---How to Ask Questions the Smart Way

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

In my view this is more related to the kernel itself more than to any distro, the devels (not only of arch) should push this issue to the kernel devels and try find a solution as this creates a very bad experience for linux users especially if they don't know anything about this mervalous system.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

This means that Arch is 10 times more hotter (and sexier) than windows ! )

Now really, assuming you ran/run windows on the same machine, then it all depends on the software that is running under the OS. Use htop to get a glimpse of what is hogging the CPU.

Also, most default linux drivers don't do 3D too well because they do not have the hardware acceleration enabled (it is proprietary), this means that you CPU will take the load. Using Gnome 3 will definitely heat up your CPU.

Re: Arch running 10°C higher than Windows

to keep my laptop running cooler the best mod I made was physical Don't try this if your laptop is still under guarantee!anyway I did it after reading the post from this guyhttp://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=25201It made a BIG difference for me.